Taking Back Mary Ellen Black

I blinked. “What? The poker game?”

“The job, you interested?”

“Working for you?”

“It’s crazy, demanding work. But you don’t have to wear that apron.”

I dragged the offensive garment over my head and tossed it on the counter. Yeah, it was temporary. I was becoming my own temp agency. Someone off with a hip replacement or a maternity leave, send in Mary Ellen Black. But I wouldn’t be handling raw meat. And hopefully I’d make more than quarters and hear a lot less pity over my divorce.

And maybe while her processor kicked back, I could figure out just exactly what I did want to be when I grew up. Hopefully, she’d be off a long time with this pregnancy and baby, because if I hadn’t figured it out in almost thirty-one years, I didn’t like my chances of figuring it out in six weeks. “Yeah, I’m interested.”

CHAPTER F

Friendship

Jenna nodded as I came around the counter. “And what about the poker game? You in?”

“Since they’re playing for money, I guess that depends on what you’re paying me,” I hedged.

She glanced around the small store; we were the only two inside. “Cash, or that creep might sue you for alimony.”

Just like Jenna, always thinking, even when I wasn’t. Just what the heck did go on inside my head? Only the orchestra of crickets singing?

“And he would,” Jenna continued. “Creep never deserved you.”

That was why Jenna and I had stopped being friends. Because of her and Eddie’s mutual animosity, I had had to choose between them, a choice I shouldn’t have had to make. Now it was clear that I shouldn’t have dropped her friendship. “I’m sorry.”

She shrugged, too proud to admit if I’d hurt her. But pain showed in her dark eyes. “You were knocked up, scared, and pressured by your parents.”

And she would know that because she’d always known everything about me. “Yeah. And in love. I really loved him. How stupid was that?”

“Cut yourself a break. It happens to the best of us.”

“Not you.”

She lifted her ringless left hand, but a faint indent marred the third finger. “I was.”

“Was not!” I ignored the pang of hurt over not being invited to her wedding. Why should she have invited me? We hadn’t been talking after my wedding day.

“Your mom never told you that?”

“She mentioned something once, but it was around the holidays and she was making rum balls. Mom’s never completely lucid when she’s making rum balls.”

Jenna chuckled and grabbed my arm, tugging me toward the door. “Mr. Black, we’re leaving for the bridge game.”

“Have fun!” my dad called from the back, a puff of smoke drifting in through the open door.

Jenna’s car waited at the curb, a black Cadillac. She clicked a switch to unlock the door, and I stepped over the leaves in the gutter to crawl inside. “God, I stink like the store. You sure you want me in here? I can walk.”

“Shut up and buckle up,” Jenna said as she slid behind the wheel. “You’re fine.”

No, I wasn’t. But talking to Jenna again after all these years gave me hope that I might be. After all, I wasn’t the only one with a newly ringless hand. I’d pawned mine to pay the cheap, neighborhood lawyer. “So tell me about your marriage.”

She laughed with no amusement. “I fell for a pretty face, a very pretty face.”

“That makes more sense than falling for Eddie. Nobody could ever call him pretty.” Thank God the girls didn’t look a bit like him. When we’d first met, I had thought he looked like Andy Garcia. Now he looked more like Danny DeVito.

She laughed again, in agreement, but no resentment flared in me. How could I resent the truth? “So he was pretty. Tell me more,” I urged.

“You know, Mom was right. Pretty is as pretty does. Never could figure out what that meant until it was too late. He was in construction. So picture the big, hard bod. Strong, silent type. Mom also says beware of the quiet ones, still waters run deep. I don’t know about deep, but he ran all around.”

“On you?”

She snorted. “Yeah, go figure. Guess I worked too much for him.” She’d always been so driven. Growing up poor had given her ambition.

“But he worked a lot, too. Out of town. Building houses.” She snorted again as she maneuvered the Cadillac through the back alley to my parents’ house. “Playing house was more like it.”

“So how’d you find out? Did he finally tell you?”

“Stupid ass had my little brother working with him—remember Rye?”

As a thirteen-year-old too small for his age. “Yes.”

“Well, Rye picked up on it. Told him to come clean. So he did…on Christmas Eve. Merry freakin’ Christmas, huh?”

“So you killed him, right?”

She laughed again as she jerked the Caddy to a halt behind my mom’s minivan. “I’ll never tell.”

“It’s me, Jenna. You’ll tell me.” It was my way of saying I hoped we could be close again, as close as we’d been when we’d told each other everything.

She stared at me for a minute, dark eyes cautious, reminding me that I’d betrayed her trust as much as her ex had. Then she sighed. “Yeah, I probably will. But right now, I’m feeling lucky. They were playing five-card stud when I left, and your granny was kicking ass.”

“Grandma?”

She nodded. “Yeah, she’s a shark.”

Did I know any of the women in my life? Grandma and Mom played poker. And Jenna had gotten cheated on, too, just as I had. I would definitely have to pay more attention to my daughters, make sure I knew them completely. Then maybe, someday, I’d find the time to work on knowing myself.

“You in?” Mom asked as she expertly shuffled the deck of playing cards and dealt them out to the women sitting around our dining-room table. No, this wasn’t a bridge game. The dainty teacups and little cakes and cookies were a bit deceiving. But a pile of brightly colored chips in the center of the lace tablecloth gave away the real game. And so did the bland poker faces of the women sitting around the table.

Bluffing. I knew the look. I’d seen it on Eddie’s face often enough these last couple of years. “Sure, deal me in.” Patting my purse that bulged with quarter tips, I slid onto a chair between Grandma and Jenna.

And memories filtered through my mind. Grandma had taught me how to play this game with my dolls during tea-time. How well could I remember her lessons? Apparently pretty well. A couple of hours later, I pushed back from the table, my pot sliding toward the edge. I’d done well. Real well.

Or they’d let me win out of pity. But I was getting as good at spotting pity as I was at recognizing bluffing. And their resentful faces, flushed from the tea and the game, told me they didn’t pity me now. I stood, swaying a bit. After the first sip, I’d discovered this tea wasn’t simply brewed. It was laced heavily with rum.

“Are you okay?” Jenna asked. “She always got sick whenever we used to drink,” she shared with our mothers.